In his delightful A History of Reading , Alberto Manguel makes the point that reading precedes writing. Yet, although whole libraries have been written about writing there is not enough on reading, the more common activity.
Perhaps this is because it is possible to be coldly objective, even clinical about writing with nods in the direction of deconstruction and semiotics and a bagful of literary theories. But any readable book on reading must necessarily be personal and brimming with passion. Few writers read that well and even fewer readers write that well.
There are scholarly, academic books on reading that are worthy efforts that, for the average reader, balance on the verge of meaning. But these tend to be dry and humourless. Written for (and read by) other academics, such books, like how-to manuals on sex, ignore the essential feature of the activity — its sheer joy.
“Reading or making love,” writes Manguel elsewhere, “we should be able to lose ourselves in the other, into whom we are transformed: reader into writer into reader, lover into lover into lover.” As with all passions, the relationship between the reader and the book is, as the critic George Steiner says, “intimate, possessive and very private. Every consummation has its perils and specific register of excitement.”
Exciting signposts
It takes a special type of bibliophile to understand this; the popular writer who signposts the path to excitement is worth a thousand scholars who squeeze the juice out of an experience. Such a one is Pradeep Sebastian, who has been writing about books for some years now and is easily our most cultured writer on the subject. His essays, brought together in The Groaning Shelf (and other instances of book love) is not just about reading though.
It is that rare Indian book, perhaps a first, about the whole caboodle that in discerning collections inhabits the shelf marked ‘books about books'.
“The book is a physical object,” says Sebastian, “And I see it as a work of art, where binding, typography, edition matter.” He recalls the time the late T.G. Vaidyanathan bought a book for its physical beauty alone. He had no intention of reading it, merely caressed it and put it back on the shelf. On another occasion he taped the edges of a book he was smitten by so it would never be opened.
Sebastian's essays make erudition accessible, as he discusses the French philosopher Diderot, C.S. Lewis, Amar Chitra Katha, Shakespeare & Co and other bookshops, Umberto Eco, antiquarian books, the first editions of J.D. Salinger's novels, Nabokov, book thieves, collectors and much more with an easy familiarity. And all this is done without once showing off, which is an achievement in itself.
Steiner's description in another context aptly sums up Sebastian who “celebrates the diversities of desire — tempestuous, hidden, intermittent, lapsed — which relate us to a literary text.”
The Groaning Shelf does not set out an agenda for itself. It is not a paean to the ‘good old days' before television and the Internet replaced books; it is not a cry for help from a booklover who sees readership dwindling and takes it upon himself to right the balance. There is no place for clichés here; nothing judgemental or admonitory. This is about one man's obsession with and involvement in the culture and tradition of bibliography. That it carries the reader along is a strength, but the effect, powerful though it may be is, in a larger sense, purely incidental.
A literary journey
It is about, as the author says, “the inner life of one reader: from re-reader to lapsed reader to (when all you can read are books about books) meta-reader.” This is not an inevitable path followed by bibliophiles, of course, but merely a portion of Sebastian's journey – exciting, educative, pleasurable, but incomplete.
The strength of The Groaning Shelf lies in its attraction not just for the bibliophile, but the non-reader whose library comprises a couple of Readers Digest condensed books, four DC comics and the Complete Works of Oscar Wilde presented by a favourite uncle in the distant past.
The true bibliophile's heart would resonate to this Manguel confession: “I discovered that one doesn't simply read Crime and Punishment or A Tree Grows in Brooklyn . One reads a certain edition, a specific copy, recognisable by the roughness or smoothness of its paper, by its scent, by a slight tear on page 72 and a coffee ring on the right hand corner of the back cover.”
It finds sympathetic vibrations from Sebastian's “I often envy non-readers for all the wonderful books that they have never read. Imagine the joy of encountering these great works for the first time. A literary fantasy of mine has been to turn amnesiac for a year and read all my favourite books as though for the very first time.”
Sebastian, who loves the cover of the books nearly as much as what is inside can be proud of this brilliant, evocative cover to his collection. The epigraph captures the spirit of the book. It is from Borges: “I don't know why I believe that a book brings us the possibility of happiness, but I am truly grateful for that modest miracle.” The Groaning Shelf is a modest miracle — a stylish, cultural landmark communicating one man's passion to a larger audience.
Pradeep Sebastian's next project suggests itself — a similar tribute to Indian books and readers.
The Groaning Shelf,Pradeep Sebastian, Hachete, p.256, Rs. 395.
